The Post-Petroleum Survival Guide and Cookbook ─ Recipes for Changing Times

Over the coming years we will need to move from a global culture addicted to cheap, abundant petroleum to a culture of compelled conservation, whether through government directive or market forces. The Post-Petroleum Survival Guide and Cookbook provides useful practical advice for preparing your family and community to make the transition.

This book takes a positive, upbeat, and optimistic view of “the Great Change,” promoting the idea that it can be an opportunity to redeem our essential interconnectedness with nature and with each other. The many rifts that have grown up since oil became the world’s prime commodity can be mended: between cities and their food sources; the design of the suburban-built environment and its car-oriented sprawl; runaway greenhouse warming, and the clearing of forests and toxification of rivers, oceans, and land. Topics covered include:

‧ Rebuilding civilization
‧ Changing your needs
‧ Water and waste disposal
‧ Energy and transportation
‧ Equipment and tools
‧ Food storage and first aid

Also including lighthearted, playful recipes—some using basic, wholesome foods, some illustrating food growing or preservation, and all emphasizing organic, flavorful, and locally grown produce that can readily substitute one for another—this book is about having your catastrophe and eating it too.

Albert Bates is an Environmental Educator and Founder of the Ecovillage Training Center at The Farm in Tennessee. He has been instrumental in facilitating the growth of the worldwide ecovillage movement into an organization of more than 20,000 communities on six continents with more than one million residents.